It has long been known that fragrance materials and essential oils can promote feelings of relaxation and well-being. More recently these materials have been used in cosmetic products to similar effect per se and to enhance the effects of other materials/actives in the products. Many of these products rely on the use of simple mixes of essential oils to provide this benefit, eg lavender, jasmin oil, camomile and ylang-ylang. Many of the materials have been reported to promote different mood states, eg lavender has been reported to be both relaxing (see Torii et al in chapter 7, “Perfumery: the Psychology and Biology of Fragrances”, S V Toller and G Dodd (eds), Chapman and Hall, 1991 reprint) and activating (see J S Jellinek, Perfumer & Flavorist, vol. 22 (September/October, 29-41). It has therefore been difficult for formulators reliably to use literature information to make effective fragrances. The materials also are not optimised for their acceptability/hedonic effect but are often very basic odour combinations with little of the creativity found in more traditional fragrances.
Aromatherapy employs essential oils which are applied to the skin, for example with massage. The effect here involves additional processes other than smell. However, there are folk remedies in which essential oils are used primarily for their smell and a mood state change may result. In these examples the oils are used singly or in simple mixtures. There is an extensive literature concerning the activities and usage of essential oils for aromatherapy; see for example Tisserand (“The Art of Aromatherapy”, C. W. Daniel, London (1985) and “Aromatherapy for Everyone”, Penguin Books (1988) both by R. Tisserand). There is also a practice to use the term more freely, for example to claim “aromatherapy products” which may claim to “contain a fragrance which is relaxing and soothing”. Consumers are aware that aromatherapy products intend to enhance the sensory experience of the user, but there is no systematic teaching that can direct the perfumer to design products that would consistently provide this benefit. In many cases the claim is more akin to a marketing positioning statement, with a view to differentiating variants or competitive products.
Aroma-Chology® is a term coined by the Olfactory Research Fund Ltd. (see the extensive review by J Jellinek in Cosmetics & Toiletries, (1994) 109, pp 83-101). It is concerned specifically with the temporary, beneficial psychological effects of aromas on human behaviours and emotions to improve mood and quality of life. In fact, a large number of products promoted as having aromatherapy benefits can be more accurately identified for their Aroma-Chology® benefits as they produce temporary psychological effects. Again, however, there is no teaching as to how to formulate products to achieve such benefits qualitatively or quantitatively with a reliable expectation of success. In addition it is well known that fragrances can be perceived as associated with different attributes in different countries. Thus it may be that a fragrance found to be “stimulating” to the Japanese consumer will not be “stimulating” to the European consumer. Prior art perfumes do not exhibit the required robustness.
Hirsch (U.S. Pat. No. 5,904,916) teaches a method for enhancing learning in a person by the administration of a mixed/floral odorant, preferably composed of fresh, citrus, herbaceous, fruity and floral odorants, exemplified by Mixed-Floral IFF No. 2635-AS. No further teaching was disclosed on other fragrances of the invention which may have similar psychological benefits.
Clow and Huckelbridge have shown that the smell of chocolate can modulate levels of secretory immunoglobulin A (IgA) which has been linked to stress and mood (see A A Stone et al in J. Personality and Social Psychology, (1987), volume 52(5), 988-993). No teachings were provided as to how this might be related to perfume development.
Japanese Patent No. 9-227399 (1997) claims extracts of plants of the Labiatae genus.
Research on the neural basis of emotion has concentrated mostly on fear. The amygdala has been identified as a key component of a network of neural pathways in fear conditioning (see J Le Doux, Annual Review of Psychology, (1995), volume v46, 209) and emotional memories. Many human emotions exist as part of complex neural systems that have evolved to help us survive. Le Doux (“The Emotional Brain: The mysterious Underpinnings of Emotional Life”, (1996), publ. Simon & Schuster Inc, New York) points out that emotional responses are hard-wired into the brain's circuitry, and that the stimuli that trigger emotional states are learned through experience. These can be uniformly perceived throughout a population, for example, the sight of a snake triggering a fear response, or of a picture of an injured child eliciting a depressed response. In contrast, the invention described herein identifies a class of perfumes which elicit similarly uniform but pleasant responses. Other fragrances are more susceptible to interpretation being governed by context, eg the country in which the assessor grew up, the appearance of the product in which the perfume is assessed, the use of the product (eg washing with soap).
Kan et al (18th International Congress, IFSCC, Venezia, (October 1994), preprints 769-784) showed that cosmetics which beautify the person have psychoimmunological effects which manifest as an increase in the body's immune status, as measured by salivary IgA. Japanese Patent No. 06172781 describes deactivating (sedative) perfumes based on the use of 1,3-dimethoxybenzene-5-methylbenzene. No teaching on other perfume ingredients was disclosed in either publication.
Alaoui-Ismaili et al (Chem. Senses (1997), 22, 237-248) sought evidence of a linkage between emotion and the sense of smell, particularly smell preference. The results did not provide evidence for the postulated preferential link between olfaction and emotion (although preference scores for their odorants agreed with literature values), leading to the conclusion that the emotional content of smell cannot be predicted from preference. Van Toller et al (Chemical Senses, (1993) vol. 18, pp 1-16) found that increased electrical activity (alpha waves) in the brain was associated with increased pleasantness, intensity and familiarity for a range of widely disparate odours.
The present invention seeks to address at least some of the problems described above, in particular that of the creative scope available to perfumers, and possibly also robustness across different consumer groups and performance reliability.